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Apple and Meta fined millions for breaching EU law

ca.finance.yahoo.com

231–240 of 635 posts

Re: Apple and Meta fined millions for breaching EU law

#231

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This seems to be a common issue for all countries, the US included. The US is much more resistant to it, which is a major factor in iOS share being higher and WhatsApp being an almost complete non event. Similarly those same users bought into the iOS option entirely because of the better privacy enabled by not being "free" in the price sense. In a very real sense Apple are the regulators of their platform in that t…

> The US is much more resistant to it, which is a major factor in iOS share being higher and WhatsApp being an almost complete non event. iOS has a larger market share in the US because iPhones are a status symbol in America whereas Europeans couldn't care less. Which in turn makes iMessages market share larger in the US than in Europe. iPhone market share is also pretty stagnant since 2023 in the US and way down wor…

> iPhones are a status symbol in America whereas Europeans couldn't care less.

Europeans absolutely could, they're just too tight fisted to actually spend money on things like protecting privacy which is a major part of the whole problem.

They are perfectly fine spending money on luxury cars.

Re: Apple and Meta fined millions for breaching EU law

#232
post #223

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> We managed OK before the internet enabled targeted ads. Back then, local newspapers were a thing (I still get them around here), and you could put an ad for your barber shop or dance hall in that To be fair, we are in a wholly different world today. The small business landscape has changed dramatically - most of them are online. I get instagram ads for my really niche hobbies, and I don't mind. Example: Let's say y…

That kind of example matches what I was saying about forums. Targeting ads to a forum is (with consent) fine, in the way that targeting a person isn't.

I see what you mean - but I am not sure it would work for the "you don't know what you don't know" cases, or cases where the user isn't invested enough to follow the relevant forum.

I personally wasn't interested in miniature titanium puzzles until I saw the ad - I'm not interested in puzzles in general, so I wouldn't have found it via a puzzle forum.

The same pattern can be seen in my other hobbies (tritium collecting, mokume and titanium/zirconium Damascus items, unique independent watches, flashlight collecting, rocks).

I'm involved enough to buy something from an ad while scrolling through my friends' timelines or reels, but certainly not enough to frequent a forum on these topics. So I am not sure forums suffice.

Re: Apple and Meta fined millions for breaching EU law

#233

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

What is ugly or uncivil about noting someone's biases? The "your small businesses would fail without Meta" line is from the official lobbyist arm of Meta, and it's usually a pretty good tell that someone is a Meta employee and is thus likely to have a very rose coloured, idealized version of the org.

[deleted]

Re: Apple and Meta fined millions for breaching EU law

#234

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The DMA is gerrymandered to exclude domestic businesses. Except Booking (~EU, based in NL~* ) falls under the DMA, and ByteDance (China? I think) does as well. All the same restrictions fall on them too. > Users are free to just not use Meta services. True in theory, not so much in practice. I work for a company that deals directly with WhatsApp in NL, and I guarantee you for businesses it's a death knell to not ha…

> Booking (EU, based in NL) Booking Holdings Inc. is incorporated in Delaware, listed on the Nasdaq with principal executive offices in Connecticut. See SEC filing: https://d18rn0p25nwr6d.cloudfront.net/CIK-0001075531/87dc4e5...

Thanks, edited my comment to reflect I was wrong there.

Re: Apple and Meta fined millions for breaching EU law

#235
post #161

> Under the DMA, app developers distributing their apps via Apple's App Store should be able to inform customers, free of charge, of alternative offers outside the App Store, steer them to those offers and allow them to make purchases. To me, this is the most easily agreeable part of what the EU has been after. It is unfair that Apple restricts Netflix from telling it's users that they can sign up and pay for Netlifx…

Aren't Americans always going on about free speech?

Every American is pro free speech for the kind of speech they like.

Re: Apple and Meta fined millions for breaching EU law

#236

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Personally I wouldn’t install software unless it were from a really trusted person doing something extremely unique and useful that doesn’t have an alternative on the Apple Store (think UTM with JIT for iPad). Please don’t take that as a negative comment but I suspect most people source their software from conveniently centralized repos whether it be App Store, Steam or even the main package manager on a Linux distri…

You mentioned linux package managers, these existing are proof enough that a 30% cut isn't required for ensuring the safety of what you install. In fact, I'd wager there is that much more dangerous garbage in the app store than in pacman's database.

The Linux package repositories take a 30% cut of zero. If the software wasn't free, it would be entirely reasonable for them to demand a cut

Re: Apple and Meta fined millions for breaching EU law

#237
post #6

Would looove to distribute an app without it having to be in the App Store, and not paying the App Store fee (direct download of signed binary). Happy to pay a yearly fee or fee per update to cover code review if it’s crucial. But 30% of revenue for doing bugger all… cmon, they’re squeezing the lemon a bit too hard.

From what I hear, users are tired of installing apps. You can make a website and not face any gatekeepers or restrictions.

Meanwhile on Hacker News: "Web apps suck. Native apps are so much better. Why can't everything be a native app?"

Re: Apple and Meta fined millions for breaching EU law

#238
US officials and businessmen keep on repeating the same thing:

> The European Commission is attempting to handicap successful American businesses while allowing Chinese and European companies to operate under different standards.

But this is wildly untrue. The EU isn't hand-picking individual organisations and fining them because they're American, they're fining them because they're in breach of existing legislation. The same legislation applies to local companies.

Ironically, it's the US who takes stances like the one they claim the EU is taken. E.g.: The US required that TikTok be sold, without actually proving that TikTok was in breach of any actual law.

But repeating the same claims gets those claims out into the media, and that's what people hear. So we see a dissonance between what the media says (and many people believe) and what's really happening.

Re: Apple and Meta fined millions for breaching EU law

#239

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are a couple of companies in the list[1] (of seven) that aren’t US-based. ByteDance are Chinese and Booking are EU (NL). [1] https://digital-markets-act.ec.europa.eu/gatekeepers_en

Booking Holdings which Wikipedia has as the parent of booking.com seems to be US owned.

Had no idea booking.com was american. I always assumed it was euro-based.

Re: Apple and Meta fined millions for breaching EU law

#240
post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That’s a terrible idea. How would they have any control over that. I think you are way overestimating the amount of iOS users that want to use software from outside the App Store.

If 3rd party stores didn't charge the Apple tax, I think you'd find plenty of apps moving to other stores, and within a matter of weeks more than half of users would have used a 3rd party store.

That’s my worst nightmare. On my iPhone I want the equivalent of Spotify, not Netflix, Hulu, Disney+, Max, etc.
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